I'm in LOOOoooOOOve...

I'm in LOOOoooOOOve...

(Insert hearts and flowers and butterflies and shit here, if you will.)

This past year, many of you dear blogophiles may have noticed that I have been considering the different forms love takes in our lives. I think it is necessary as an author to be a weird combination of philosopher and people watcher. I think it adds to the dimension of our characters and our ability to bring them to life for you readers out there. I can't make you feel punched in the gut with emotion... make tears clog up in your eyes or have you snarf coffee all over the screen if I, the author, am not feeling the emotions as I paint with my palette of words.

I certainly can't turn you on and have your face flush if I don't understand passion.

That said, I have always thought that I have a lot in common with Jane Austen--when it comes to romance, anyway.

I don't believe in love at first sight. I never have. Lust at first sight, okay. Chemistry at first sight, sure.

Love? Yeah, no. I don't believe it. I know some of you are enthralled with the idea of it but me, personally, no. I believe that love, real love, is something that is built up over conversations. Love is built up over time when you see that person, really see them for who they are... and still care.

That person might not be a knight in shining armor. He might not always make the right choices. He might not always look like a cover model from a romance novel.

But there is something about them...

Once I fell in love with my best friend. Which was funny, really, because I had REFUSED to go out with him. He was a dork. He wasn't my type. I had a thousand reasons to say NO. Lucky for me, he was a stubborn asshole who kept nudging and nudging until I finally caved. And then he bloody well ignored me. Seriously. He would take me to movies and dinner and talk up a storm...

But he never held my hand or tried to kiss me. This shit went on for MONTHS.

It went on exactly the right amount of time for me to realize that I LIKED him. (Which reminded me of a line off Vampire Diaries last night. "It's right. It's just not right now.") Not just as a friend. It let me get past myself and see him for who he was and that I liked it. It got me to a point that I couldn't help but smile when he grinned and his eyes crinkled just so...

And also to a point that I had firmly decided (because I am sometimes psychic... But my amazing psychic abilities are for another post) that he didn't like me like THAT.

So when he finally got around to kissing me, my head shot off my shoulders and my heart leapt to my throat and all in all, I fell harder than I had ever fallen before.

Y'see, if they are your best friend, it is next to impossible to guard your heart from them.

Which was a hard lesson to learn. I bet you were hoping that this was the part where I told you we went off into the sunset and lived happily ever after and have been married now for x-amount of years and some other great stuff like that.

Nope.

Oh, I can tell you more goopy romantic stuff though. He once Cinderella'd me. I refused to go to the ball. Refused. I had about a hundred excuses. So, once he had battered down enough of them, I went with more mundane excuses on the day of the ball. "I don't have a dress."

He produced a dress, perfect, and in my size. So now I am standing there, scraping the bottom of the excuse barrel. "I don't have shoes. Or underthings for a dress and..."

He pulls out shoes and underthings. Me- How did you know what SIZE???

Him-grin.

"Well, I can't go to a ball without my hair fixed." shrug "Or a sitter. So you see it is really IMPOSSIBLE for me to go to the ball."

You know that man had a HAIRDRESSER lined up? *wiggles fingers at HC* It was downright devious.

Anyway, he also once tried to give me a ring... Which I also rejected with a panic attack kind of reaction. I refused to open it until he had ensured me it wasn't THAT kind of ring.

(Are you getting from this that I am not the easiest woman in the world to DATE? I fully expect the comments section below to be FULL of offers from men needing more rejection in their lives. Cuz, man, am I a keeper or WHAT??)

But like I said, this story doesn't have the happy ever after that I am sure you expected. Because in real life, sometimes shit happens. People, no matter how gooshy and sugery and sexy it all may have been, find ways to make it all fall apart.

Here's the deal, though. If it hadn't fallen all apart, I wouldn't be who I am today. I wouldn't have learned--ever--how independent I can really be. I would have spent my life leaning on his strength. I would have known, every day at any hour, that Mr. Knight in Shining Armor-even-if-rusty would come and save the day.

But knowing that the Knight wasn't there allowed me to find out I am resourceful. I am stubborn, too. (Probably I should have realized that before... yeah, I am stubborn about realizing I am stubborn, too. Go fig.) I had people who controlled my life when he was around. I never would have sloughed those chains loose if I knew that he could scrape my ass out of any hole I fell in.

So my happily ever after was that he left. That I found out how kickass I am. That I can survive anything.

I wouldn't have found any of that out if I hadn't lost him. Because losing him (and a few other things that kicked my ass... deaths of people I loved and such) was one of the hardest things I ever survived. I don't think I have ever cried so hard as I did when I realized it was over. That it could never be like that again. That it was really, and truly done.

He is still around, by the way. He will never read this but others will read it and know who I was talking about so I am calling myself out in public big time here. *wiggles fingers at HC again*

But I am doing it to make a point.

Yes, my dearies, here comes MamaVirg's moral for the day...

You hear that saying all the time. "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."

And it sounds so damn trite. And if you are hurting, to be honest it doesn't make you feel one little bit better.

But it is true. I really wouldn't be who I am today if I had never loved like that. Just like I wouldn't be who I am if I hadn't lost like that. I could have a whole conversation just with my eyes with this man. He could turn me on with a glance. He could make me feel like no one else had before him.

Because he made me get past ME and go outside my comfort zone. When I said something stupid and talked out my ass, he knew when to shrug and not argue and let reality prove him right. And he made me learn to live without him. Again, get past what I thought I knew and see the world without the rosy glasses I like to wear.

I HAD to break to become whole. Too many pieces of me were broken when he was around for me to keep going the way I had been. I had to break to put the pieces back in an order that I could live with.

Sometimes losing someone is just as important as falling in love.

You won't find that between the covers of a romance novel. But I really think it is true. Sometimes you live your life happy the way you are even if the way you are is a little broken. A little askew. And it takes someone breaking that askew bit, and you resetting the bone, so to speak, for you to really heal.

Does that mean that I don't sometimes miss my friend... a lot?

Hell no. I am not some kind of superhero. No one is ever happy to lose a friend, especially one who really knows you, even the icky bits, and cares anyway.

But I can see that life had to work that way.

Fall in love whenever you can. And don't be afraid of falling out of it either. Because everything happens for a reason.

Even if you can't see the reason past the sheen of tears.

Okay, told you today was going to be deep and meaningful shit. *waggles brows* I called myself out on my own blog. But I hope you get the moral behind it. I know a few hearts out there are hurting... feeling alone and like the world will never again look right without that one that they loved.

This blog was for my broken hearted friends. You can go on. You will.

And it will all be for a reason.

Keep waking up in the morning. Keep healing. And always...

Believe in love.